Power of Arduino and Raspberry Pi combined in $99 Android/Linux PC

Arduino board uses quad-core ARM CPU for the power of "4 Raspberry Pis."

The Raspberry Pi is all the rage for hobbyists in search of cheap, credit card-sized computers that can run a full PC operating system. Arduino boards have been around nearly a decade, meanwhile, powering robots and all sorts of other creative electronics projects.

Now, a project called UDOO ("you do") seeks to bring the best elements of Raspberry Pi and Arduino together into a single mini-PC that can run either Android or Linux.

"With UDOO, we want to combine the winning characteristics of Arduino and Raspberry Pi in one single board. The simplicity of Arduino in managing sensors, combined with the flexibility of a microcomputer based on ARM are integrated in UDOO, giving you a powerful prototyping board able to run Linux or Android," UDOO project coordinator Bruno Sinopoli, a Carnegie Mellon professor in electrical and computer engineering, said in a video on UDOO's Kickstarter page.

UDOO-based projects demonstrated in the video included a camera-equipped toy car controlled remotely with a tablet, programming education for kids, and a video game involving players running on equipment reminiscent of the Wii Balance Board. Touchscreens and various other types of sensors can be connected to the UDOO.

"Want to build an LED light-controller, a RFID reader, or a creative game controller? UDOO allows you to create any kind of project and share it with the community," the Kickstarter page states. "Combining the flexibility of Arduino with the power of Android or Linux, you can create and update tons of stand-alone solutions without worrying about the linking between the two worlds and their wiring."

The UDOO has the same pins as the Arduino DUE, as well as the DUE's ARM SAM3X processor, which is dedicated to the GPIO pins. Android 4.0.4 or Linux (Ubuntu 11.10) runs on a second processor, a dual- or quad-core i.MX6 Freescale chip, based on the ARM Cortex A9.

UDOO's Kickstarter page claims the board will have "the power of four Raspberry Pis," apparently in reference to the quad-core chip. The Raspberry Pi uses a single-core ARM chip. The UDOO also has twice as much RAM (1GB) and Gigabit Ethernet as opposed to the Pi's 100 Megabit Ethernet. The Raspberry Pi has the UDOO beat on price, though, with models selling for $25 or $35.

The UDOO was seeking $27,000 to jump start development of the computer. It has already received about $95,000 in six days, with pledges being taken until June 8. Pledges of $99 or more will net contributors a dual-core UDOO board, while a $119 pledge will get you a quad-core board. The dual- and quad-core boards will retail for the slightly higher prices of $109 and $129, respectively, the Kickstarter page says. Contributors are expected to get their deliveries in September of this year.

At 4.33×3.35 inches, the UDOO is a little bigger than the Raspberry Pi's 3.37×2.13 inches. Here's UDOO's list of components:

The UDOO has been in development for more than a year, and the team says it is "80 percent ready" to deliver the final product. Although UDOO has surpassed its Kickstarter funding goal, there are still pre-order boards available to contributors.

To see more about the UDOO, check out this video:

UDOO

Promoted Comments

The dual A9 will easily be 'as powerful' as 4 Raspberry Pi machines. The Pi uses a pretty weak ARM11 processor, an A9 will typically give >2x the IPC, and probably will also have a higher clock. The quad version (if you can find uses for all 4 cores) would be a lot more then 4x as fast relative to the Pi.

Well, now this looks like it could easily be my next HTPC. My biggest issue with the PI is how laggy the interface is - it just seems to be a -stitch- short in computing power to both run the video AND the interface. With a quad core processor though, it should be more than sufficient.

Why OR? I run both on my smartphone, if you're designing something from the ground up you could easily build it so you have Linux in chroot and have an X11 video buffer available in the Android system so that you could use GUI Linux apps.

The dual A9 will easily be 'as powerful' as 4 Raspberry Pi machines. The Pi uses a pretty weak ARM11 processor, an A9 will typically give >2x the IPC, and probably will also have a higher clock. The quad version (if you can find uses for all 4 cores) would be a lot more then 4x as fast relative to the Pi.

Why OR? I run both on my smartphone, if you're designing something from the ground up you could easily build it so you have Linux in chroot and have an X11 video buffer available in the Android system so that you could use GUI Linux apps.

Because chroot sucks, quite frankly. You end up wasting RAM running two entirely incompatible environments, let alone the fact that Linux apps in the chroot environment are unable to access nice things like OpenGL.

Nice to see a SATA connector, as the lack of such was holding me back from getting a APC board.

Seems they have even thought of the option to turn this into the basis for a open tablet, as there are apparently both touchscreen and battery headers onboard. Do wonder how small a case all that can be crammed into, as i would love something in the 4-6" range (i miss my retired N800).

While I like the concept, I don't see a whole lot of benefit for MOST applications over a traditional computer. Everyone has a laptop now a days and a duo costs $30. What you are essentially paying for is a dedicated Arduino computer.

While I like the concept, I don't see a whole lot of benefit for MOST applications over a traditional computer. Everyone has a laptop now a days and a duo costs $30. What you are essentially paying for is a dedicated Arduino computer.

For a lot of us having easily to use io is the point, make great sensor servers or home automation servers.Decent choice of programming languages (c ,c++ , objective c, python ,java, aida, fortran , html, javascript etc)

why do you want to run a 400w+ computer when you can run one under 15w ?

Boards like this enable smarter devices , better robots and better AI.Easy to solar power if you want or use as a car pc and add gps/3g.

I get the impression that the real benefit of this more expensive Arduino board is the extensive IO capability, including a built-in analog interface. This might make it cheaper overall for robotics and sensor acquisition.

Unfortunately, it looks like they copied the stupid Arduino header layout, with one group of headers offset by half a pin spacing. This means you can't use a normal protoboard or breadboard, only "Arduino" boards. Someone please tell me my eyes are just playing tricks on me?

Unfortunately, it looks like they copied the stupid Arduino header layout, with one group of headers offset by half a pin spacing. This means you can't use a normal protoboard or breadboard, only "Arduino" boards. Someone please tell me my eyes are just playing tricks on me?

I didn't look at the pin-layout, but in the video they make particular mention of saying the pin-mappings are the same. =/

frankly, as long as it can run xbmc substantially better than an rpi (and the rpi runs it perfectly well, just a little slow in the gui and maybe not perfect with the emulators), it'll sell easily in the 100k units range. even at 109...

i suppose the real show stopper might be how much power it uses, and what the cost will be for the PS.

Unfortunately, it looks like they copied the stupid Arduino header layout, with one group of headers offset by half a pin spacing. This means you can't use a normal protoboard or breadboard, only "Arduino" boards. Someone please tell me my eyes are just playing tricks on me?

thats the point so its arduino compatible and existing hardware plugs straight in and existing code runs

Have you actually looked at those? Do you really think those are easier to use with a normal protoboard?

Yes looked at those. Work with boards like that quite a lot (mostly micros and fpga)wanda board looks pretty easy to work with(gpio). Not hard to make a breakout cable and plug into any sort of board/breadboard you want to work with. No harder than working with raspberrypi (wandaboard)Sabre boards are a bit tricker

Yes looked at those. Work with boards like that quite a lot (mostly micros and fpga)wanda board looks pretty easy to work with(gpio). Not hard to make a breakout cable and plug into any sort of board/breadboard you want to work with. No harder than working with raspberrypi (wandaboard)Sabre boards are a bit tricker

Look closer. Both use high-density connectors that essentially require a custom board. Fabricating a cable will be a lot more labor intensive and the result will be more fragile.

And even if they had Arduino-like 0.1" pitch pin headers with a sane layout, it doesn't change the fact that the common Arduino layout being used on this board is just stupid. There's no need for that half-pitch offset. It continues to cause nothing but trouble...I've seen clone and add-on makers bitten because they inadvertently did the logical thing and aligned the headers to the same 0.1" grid rather than inexplicably offsetting some. And given that all but the most trivial boards will be incompatible with the 3.3V interface, failing to work at best and destroying the UDOO at worst, there's good reason to make the change now.

I just managed 500,000 BOINC credits in 1 month with a few of these plus a very-weak-at-BOINC, cheap genereic tab.

I've had a Pi even longer and am embarassed by the lack of Android support from an organisation that has sold >1 million units. (Please don't point me in the direction of any ancient Android hype from the RPi foundation. Read the reviews ... "unuseable".)

I just managed 500,000 BOINC credits in 1 month with a few of these plus a very-weak-at-BOINC, cheap genereic tab.

I've had a Pi even longer and am embarassed by the lack of Android support from an organisation that has sold >1 million units. (Please don't point me in the direction of any ancient Android hype from the RPi foundation. Read the reviews ... "unuseable".)

different target audiences.

odroids are nice but not so good for interfacing.I'd love one with an exynos 5 , Gb ethernet and sata connector

complaining about lack of android support from raspberrypi is a bit dumb android runs much better on arm cortex than arm11 ,what were you expecting for the price ?and its purpose is for education.

And even if they had Arduino-like 0.1" pitch pin headers with a sane layout, it doesn't change the fact that the common Arduino layout being used on this board is just stupid. There's no need for that half-pitch offset. It continues to cause nothing but trouble...I've seen clone and add-on makers bitten because they inadvertently did the logical thing and aligned the headers to the same 0.1" grid rather than inexplicably offsetting some. And given that all but the most trivial boards will be incompatible with the 3.3V interface, failing to work at best and destroying the UDOO at worst, there's good reason to make the change now.

Agreed, Arduino's gap-tooth header thing is, to use a precise technical term, stupid and bad. But don't blame the UDOO designers for perpetuating it, they're just bolting an Arudino Due onto the side of an ARM/Linux board here. If Arduino had done the sensible thing and fixed the header layout with the 3.3V transition, everyone else could have easily followed suit.

The thing is, I bet Arduino is very happy with the outcome of this mistake. There's a little industry built up around this layout now, allowing them to sell you stupidcrap where you might otherwise have been able to use generic protoboards to build your own designs, for instance. It's like a subtle but effective hardware DRM scheme, offering no benefit to the end user and a bit of extra captured revenue to the vendor.

On the subject of UDOO, I've been trying to convince myself that I want to buy one but the use case just seems so narrow. It could be a great board for running a pick and place machine, perhaps, with the Arduino running motor control and the other part running a UI, storage and computer vision. Beyond that, I just don't get it. I'm going to try to save my money for the upcoming BeagleBone revision instead. Or just save my pennies and play with my Pi.

I actually wish the Raspberry Pi foundation would occasionally go after these kinds of claims by reminding authors of the trademark status of "Raspberry Pi" and that it is not a generic term for "cheap ARM SBC".

This product may be great, but what interests me about the RPI and why I have one is because the whole point is education and being a real computer. A slow computer, but still a full fledged computer, not just a set top box. My son may not understand why typing "robert tux type" at the command line doesn't work yet, but he's learning.

The dual A9 will easily be 'as powerful' as 4 Raspberry Pi machines. The Pi uses a pretty weak ARM11 processor, an A9 will typically give >2x the IPC, and probably will also have a higher clock. The quad version (if you can find uses for all 4 cores) would be a lot more then 4x as fast relative to the Pi.

I'll tell you what to use those extra cores for; openFrameworks and libpd. Now excuse me while I go find my wallet...

Well, now this looks like it could easily be my next HTPC. My biggest issue with the PI is how laggy the interface is - it just seems to be a -stitch- short in computing power to both run the video AND the interface. With a quad core processor though, it should be more than sufficient.

I felt the same, but overclocking the Pi really helped. Have you tried that yet?